How Did THEY Get it Wrong: Liberal Hawks

Liberal hawks? Odd conjunction of words. Nonetheless, Slate.com presents an essay today by asking several 'liberal hawks' who supported the George Bush War, How did you get Iraq wrong?

One of the respondents said, "I didn't realize how incompetent the Bush administration could be." Oh, really? Apparently there was some evidence to the contrary that I missed? Like the PDB that sat collecting dust on the desk of Bush while he vacationed for a month in August 2001. The one whose title read, "bin laden planning to attack United States."

Another response is the one that I exposed in many of my postings on the topic: "I admit it—I wanted to strike back." Vengeance for 9-11. Wrong country, wrong leader, but any two-bit dictator would be a fine scapegoat for not finding bin Laden.

"I trusted Colin Powell and his circumstantial evidence—for a little while," said another. Many Americans trusted him, but the facts were clear that the UN inspectors scoured Iraq and found nothing. Powell was one of the worst traitors in modern time.

Yet another gave this puzzling spin on his lack of wisdom: "I underestimated the self-centeredness and sectarianism of the ruling elite and the social impact of 30 years of extreme dictatorship." Huh? Could somebody diagram that sentence and then translate it into English?

Liberal hawk! Just as stupid as conservative hawks! Maybe even worse because they carry with them a sense of higher intellect. Wrong!

Bush Speech Hails Iraq 'Victory'

[guest posting from EngineerofKnowledge]

President George W Bush has delivered a speech to mark the fifth anniversary of the US-led invasion of Iraq. In this posting I will take the “Bush speak” and present counter points and facts to make sure the truth is presented.

Speaking at the Pentagon, Mr. Bush said "removing Saddam Hussein from power was the right decision."

Response:
(Then why in the 1980’s did Rumsfeld reestablish relations after President Carter placed sanctions on him because of his dictatorship regime. Rumsfeld was proactive in re-establishing relations that he secured loans for Saddam so he could afford our weapons to go to war with Iran? This financial support to supply Saddam with war materials on borrowed money from other countries, for the American tax payers to foot the bill, went on for almost a full decade. The U.S. citizens are now not even able to pay the interest due on this borrowed money.)

Bush went on to say that the recent "surge" of US troops to Iraq has brought about "a major strategic victory in the broader war on terror."

Response:
(The only reason that it appears that the “surge” is working is because the real Shea power in Iraq, the religious cleric Al Sader, has called a temporary cease fire from his followers and troops. It can quickly start back up on his command. Al-Sader intends the formation of a political party and is contemplating taking part in general elections in Iraq. Al-Sader has also stated, “We will not permit aggressions against Syria, Iran, or a continuation in Iraq.” Al-Sader is hoping Bush will just claim victory again and pull the troops out or wait to see how the elections will go in the U.S. The true decision of what happens in Iraq is his.)

'Necessary costs'
(Now on this subject, I am writing from the viewpoint of a very financially conservative Republican from the 1st Congressional District of Maryland and like I have said before, I work with more information than most people have at hand.)

The following statement from Bush’s speech comes amid criticism in the US of the war, with some critics pointing to its high cost. In his speech, Mr. Bush dismissed what he called the "exaggerated estimates" of the cost. "The costs are necessary when we consider the cost of a strategic victory for our enemies in Iraq."

Response:
(A Pentagon Account Director with 20 years experience, who had outstanding evaluations for the years past, questioned invoices from Halliburton that were not justified by billing from Halliburton. When she asked for documentation that would justify these invoices, she after 20 years performing her duties with accolade evaluations, had her job performance recorded as being unacceptable and was fired. This is just one example of the many “No Bid” contracts handed out to political contributing supporters that has cost over runs of the tax payers in this country. Many here in the U.S. do not realize that most of the “No Bid” contracts awarded are subcontracted out in Iraq at a very small fraction of the contract. It is typical that on average, that for every Million dollar “No Bid” contract, it is passed onto an Iraqi subcontractor for about $50,000 leaving the original contract profit of $950,000 to the “Good Old Boy.” The continuation of this discombobulation is that there is no quantity control of the actual work being done. The new police barracks in Fallujah has plumbing where raw sewage running out through the walls and onto the floors. This new building that tax payers have funded, it cannot even be used because of the health reasons. Now of course the paper work in the Pentagon is stamped, “Job Complete.” This again is just one more example of what are the rule and not the exception of what the true conditions in Iraq’s reality.)

From the world’s view, the BBC's reporter, Richard Lister in Washington said, “That the speech conspicuously lacked any references to Iraqi weapons of mass destruction - the removal of which had been the stated aim of the war. President Bush appeared to be attempting to redefine the invasion as a mission to remove Saddam Hussein.

Summation:
(If Bush can’t dazzle you with brilliance, the only thing he has left is to try to baffle you with Bull Crap)

The 5-Year Error

"No Blood for Oil!" That was one of the many pre-war signs that people held on the street corners of Toledo five years ago today. If it was for oil, then that was an error as well. Oil was $28 dollars a barrel then, $109 yesterday.

'Shock 'n Awe' was the catchy phrase the Pentagon attached to the opening salvo; they like to give cute names to war games. Who was shocked? Who was awed? The shock is that it sill goes on; the awe is 4000 dead soldiers and Marines. Another one is $1,000,000,000 of our tax dollars down the drain. Well, not exactly down the drain: Halliburton, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon , Westinghouse Electric Corporation , Siemens AG , McDonnell Douglas , Lockheed Martin , Kellogg, Brown and Root , Pratt & Whitney ,Honeywell , General Dynamics , Bechtel Corporation , Boeing Company , Carlyle Group and several hundred others have received a large amount of those tax dollars over the past 5 years.

George Bush is going to address the nation today. I vividly recall his evening address 5 years ago: a much younger, clearly naive man reading word for word, a slight smirk on his face, blinking incessantly with every word he uttered. That blinking was a clear give-away that what he was saying was a pile of crap. It was.

What will this ne'erdowell say to us today? 'Mission accomplished' again? 'We're fighting terrorists?' We found the WMD's? 'We're bring'n democracy and freedom?' 'We're fignting them over there so that we won't have to fight over here?'

Dick Cheney will not be at his side. He's out of the country telling the same live 5 years in a row. Can you believe it- yesterday he linked Saddam to 9-11. Again. And some Americans will believe the man, the liar, the fool.

Warmonger McCain made a gross error yesterday in Jordan saying that Iran is training al-Qaeda and sending them into Iraq. Republican Joe Lieberman, standing at his side, had to correct McCain.

I suppose it is all very confusing for us Americans. Five years of lies and spin. Think of the names of morons who have come and gone during this time: Colin Powell, L. Paul Bremer, Paul Wolfowitz, Ahmed Chalaby, Don Rumsfeld. All liars.

No wonder there are still some Americans who are totally bamboozled, totally confused by their early patriotic brainwashing. Two of them regularly show up here. One is a 20-year-old who was only 15 when it began. His brain was easily brainwashed due to lack of wisdom and history. The other is a 60-year-old fundamentalist Christian who believes anything George Bush says because her brain has been usurped by authority-worship. Then there are those who still can't believe that they were duped and will not give up, still in denial, still fighting to find those elusive WMD's. That former WSPD radio jock Bob Frantz, now in Cleveland, comes to mind.

Dead-enders all.

Not quite so dead as the 4000 Americans who followed their orders, the orders given to them by George Bush. Today in downtown Toledo there is a breath-taking display of tombstones dotting the Lucas County Courthouse lawn. For all of those armchair apologists for the George Bush war, this is a stark reminder that we are not playing a video game.

What will George Bush say to us today? Does it matter? The little boy who cried 'Wolf! Wolf!' comes to mind.

Today's Democratic Split Can Be Seen in Toledo's A-team/B-team Dems

I suggested this mini-drama scenario several weeks ago on the GlassCityJungle blog but was rebuffed for the implication. I raise it once again after reading today's P.M. Carpenter's op ed, "The Democratic Party's Deepest Internal Battle: It's Not One of Gender and Race." Carpenter contends that "Her gender and her opponent's race now keep her afloat, but again, let there be no doubt that at the core of the party's modern-day split is the deeper historical and ideological division between long-term, visionary progressivism and short-term, opportunistic neoconservatism."

Clinton's strength is with the old, established and entrenched political bosses of the Democratic Party, people who hold positions in the party through political favors and their work in electing party Dems to office. The governors of Ohio and Pennsylvania know these people and owe their governorship to these trench Dems. Clinton benefited here in Ohio and will in PA through the campaign organization of office holders like Rendell and Strickland.

Four years ago here in Toledo there was a power coup. Entrenched Democrats wrestled control of the local party from a group of progressive Democrats. The A-teamers, as these progressives were called, were young and idealistic, and had control of both the city council and mayor's office. Ellen Gracheck, Wade Kapszukiewicz, Mike Ashford, Karyn McConnell-Hancock and Frank Szollosi were the fresh Democratic faces on council, all under 30. The B-team Dems, old time party bosses like John Irish, Sandy Isenberg, Dominic Montalto, Jack Wilson, Dennis Duffey, Ray Kest and Carty Finkbeiner, were out-voted by the younger, more progressive Dems. The B-team got hold of the local party in 2005.

Interestingly, Democratic mayor Jack Ford, another A-team Dem and Toledo's first black mayor, was ousted by this group of B-team Dems; Carty Finkbeiner, the notorious, feisty previous mayor, won the Democratic primary and re-election. Party bossism out-muscled progressive thinking.

As Hillary Clinton gets her support from party bosses, entrenched loyalists tied to the past, Obama is winning new Democrats and old ones tired of political bossism. Toledo's A-team, B-team fiasco is now playing out in Pennsylvania.

Dick Cheney: One of Americas Greatest Traitors

Alger Hiss and Benedict Arnold pale in comparison to the traitorous actions of Bush Vice President Dick Cheney. No man in modern American history has done more to destabilize and damage this nation than Dick Cheney.

His first betrayal of the American citizens occurred early in his administration when he gathered the corporate executives from the major energy industries together to reveal his plan for them to gouge and rape the citizens. Lowering of environmental standards, under-staffing watchdog agencies, and allowing public lands to be stripped of their resources so that these companies could turn record profits was his plan. Today's high energy prices are the result of this betrayal of the public trust of his office, his oath to 'preserve and protect' this nation.

His second traitorous act was his encouragement and lies to engage our nation in the War on Iraq. With his neocon allies, he spun the dangers of Saddam Hussein even dropping the threat of nuclear annihilation from this two-bit dictator. He used and sought every chance he could to publicly propagandize the dangers of Iraq and the need for the American military to invade that nation.

Were there not that bounty of oil beneath those desert sands, the 'danger' would not have been severe enough to bring a military force of 150,000 Americans to that land. The cunning Cheney was providing even more booty to the oil executives with whom he had earlier met in that very secret energy meeting.

Of course his former company Halliburton has cashed in on billions of tax payer dollars for facilitating the logistics of the war. How many winks and handshakes were there as Cheney and his neocons made plans for the invasion 5 years ago tomorrow?

There is no doubt in my mind that Dick Cheney alone has cause more misery, suffering and economic hardship for the citizens of this nation than any other traitor in our history.

How Countries Obtain And Sustain Dominance In The World

[guest post from EngineerofKnowledge]

I was having a conversation last week with one of my intellectual friends and we were pondering and analyzing why the British Empire had acquired so much power and influential dominance within their time period of over 200 years. Although small in area and population, Britain still was able to dominate the world’s political and economic demographics for almost 200 years. An example comes to mind of the modern counties of Canada, United States, Australia, New Zealand, India, etc, were created due to Britain’s influence in the world.

I have a personal collection set of Harvard University Classics books one which is titled, “The Wealth of Nations.” Short version summation of this book is the country that imports raw materials and performs the value added aspect, is the one who really controls the economy. The countries that export the raw material are the one’s that are subservient (third world) to those whom convert the raw material into products to be purchased, many times by the country that supplied the raw materials in the first place. Being able to control another country’s economy, you can control their politics and policies.

Reviewing Britain’s historical road to dominance is noted by the fact that they were one of the first countries to industrialize. Britain’s industrial revolution started first by dominating the textile industries, followed by iron and steel manufacturing. Britain was so protective of their technological lead in textiles that even people of the machinist trade working in the textile trades were not allowed to leave the country. It was not until those, based on religious freedoms, were allowed to come to the New England area of the American Colonies that the knowledge of British textile manufacturing technologies migrated into another country for competition.

Even today, traditionally the first industry that starts the industrialization of a country is the textile industry. Low educated work force is all that is required to start but all the while, bring up the education level in manufacturing of this work force as time progresses. This better educated work force is soon able to move into others areas.

Last week I had read in an economical report that noted a U.S. national statistics making the following observation. “Scrap meal was one of America’s most valuable exports last year, thanks to the rapid growth in China and India, where it is used in construction materials.” In a sense, China’s and India’s industrial might is being created out of our own ruins.

Just go to any clothing store and see how much dominance China and India have in our once textile industries. You will be challenged to find anything made in the U.S. at the retail dominating Wal-Mart stores.

As our domestic automobile industry is dying in the U.S., Ford Motors is opening up an automobile engine manufacturing plant in India. These engines are to be used in all of Ford’s products throughout the world. Ford is investing billions of dollars in this manufacturing plant, while they are closing the same type of facility in the U.S. and laying off American workers.

Some will say that it was the Unions that ruined the manufacturing aspect in this country but I counter that the McDonald’s part time high school student’s wage scale is not able to compete with the manufacturing labor rates in China and India.

It is usually good news for domestic products when the U.S. currency is devalued on the foreign exchange because it makes our manufactured goods cheaper for people in foreign countries to afford. The problem with this today is that for the last seven years we have aggressively dismantled our manufacturing infrastructure in this country and the multi-national corporations have setup new production plants in the Far East Pacific Rim. We no longer truly manufacture, the value added aspect, many products in this country so we cannot capitalize on the dollar being devalued on the world market. All we have is the higher cost paid for the products manufactured in the other countries. The record cost of oil and gold are a good examples of what is referred to Barometer Commodities.

Watching the Bloomberg financial report, the comment was made that our economy has not been this bad since the depression of the 1930’s. Job losses, bank failures, repossession of families’ homes, etc. were given as the examples. I would like to point out that we still had a stable manufacturing base in the 1930’s that we no longer have today.

So in summation, the policies of this administration have lead us into the worst finical, political, and long term devastation that will take decades to correct. It has never been more important for the citizens of this country to choose wisely this November, at all levels of government, if we are going to recover from the devastation of the “What’s My Cut On This Contract” and Pad my Pockets” policies of the last eight years.

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It's the Economy, Mr. Bush! That's the Terrorism American Citizens Face

It''s the fourth disaster of the Bush Administration and the scariest of all. His do-nothing 9-11 stupidity led off his string of blunders during his first year. Then the Bush War on Iraq entering its 6th year this week. Katrina and the 'Brownie' incompetence brought it home again. Now, the mortgage meltdown, the shrinking value of the dollar, the oil fiasco, and today the band-aid-approach to the financial mess rears its ugly head. The Fed bails out yet another failing lending company, a company dealing in pirate predatory practices on the American people.

It's 4 for 4 for the naive governor of Texas. If he attacks Iran before his term is out, he will close his career with a 5 for 5 record.

Who voted for this man? Who voted TWICE for this man? Shame on you! to borrow a Hillary interjection. What were you thinking? Were you thinking? What made you so sure that this Texas ne'erdowell would be anything more than what he had been in the past: a failure all of his adult life? I don't get it. Couldn't you see right through the man back in 1999 and 2000? What attracted you to him? I saw a con man at first listening to him. A con man, that's all.

Fools. Apparently the American electorate is easily duped, easily bamboozled.

I wonder if they really have 'had enough'? Or will some slick TV commercial in October bamboozle them once again?

Cheney Follows McCain Into the Iraq Mess They Created

Dick 'mushroom cloud' Cheney surprised John McCain and perhaps upstaged him landing in Iraq last night. No doubt Cheney wanted to view the 'progress' that the nation has made since Shock 'n Awe commenced five years ago this week. Progress? Oh, THAT progress: al-Qaeda is now there and operating training schools at will through the country. On March 19, 2003 al-Qaeda was not in Iraq even though Cheney said they were. Confused?

Maybe Cheney wanted to get out of America on what is billed as the greatest economic disaster day of this administration: the mortgage crisis and subsequent melt down of the market and fall of the dollar. His undisclosed bunker would have been a better place for this jackass.

John McCain, poor man, was quoted as saying that both Clinton and Obama are telling al-Qaeda that we will be pulling out and, get this one: they [al Qaeda] will be following us back here. Yes, he said that: if we pullout, they will be following us home. Delusional, just like Bush, Cheney, Rice, and Rumsfeld.

Mushroom cloud. WMD's. Al-Qaeda link to Saddam. Uranium from Africa. Mission Accomplished. They will follow us here if we surrender.

Ready to vomit yet?

5th Anniversary: No Celebration

My grandson will be 5 this year and we will celebrate, no doubt, with balloons, cake, presents and singing. It's good to celebrate his 5th year as a good and healthy boy, full of energy, smiles, and devilishness.

Sadly this Wednesday we will recall the 5th anniversary of Shock 'n Awe, that bombing raid in the middle of the night on the city of Baghdad that began the George Bush War on Iraq. Lots of cheering Americans sitting comfortably in their living rooms, glued to CNN. It was like a 4th of July fireworks display. Flags decorated the houses and the cars. We felt so 'proud' to see our might military attack this capital city.

It was an odd way to take down a dastardly dictator, though. Destroying large parts of a city, killing civilians, and causing terror throughout the city of 5,000,000 people. We missed hitting him, but that didn't matter because we were getting 'revenge' on the man who, according to Dick Cheney, supported al Qaeda and thereby had a link to our own 9-11 bombings.

At last vengance was wrought; our appetite for revenge was sated.

Of course, it was the wrong group of people, wrong leader, wrong nation, but what the hell, we did it anyway. And it felt good! Once again the United States of America prevailed. It looked especially comforting to watch the American flg being draped over that tumbling statue of Saddam. It was our Iwo Jima.

This Wednesday in downtown Toledo we will be able to see some of the results of the Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld-Rice War on Iraq at 6:30 in th evening. Five thousand gray, wooden tombstones will greet the visitors. They represent the American soldiers and Marines who have died in these past 5 years because George Bush needed to get revenge on one man who disgraced his father.

Where: Lucas County Court House Adams and Erie (in Toledo) When: Wednesday, Mar. 19, 2008, at 6:30 PM

What: candelight vigil